


Object Relations

by faithinthepoor



Category: Desperate Housewives
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-16
Updated: 2014-07-16
Packaged: 2018-02-09 01:39:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,573
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1964094
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/faithinthepoor/pseuds/faithinthepoor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Set during Who’s That Woman</p>
            </blockquote>





	Object Relations

Planning and co-ordination have always been her allies, she had come to believe that with the right amount of preparation she could control anything, even the uncontrollable, especially the uncontrollable – that tides and the weather would do her bidding and that fate and kismet would follow her will. She hasn’t become lax in her preparation, if anything her focus has become more acute and yet she is forced to admit that her omnipotence is fading at an alarming rate. Her carefully constructed efforts didn’t stop Rex from moving out and her impeccable planning didn’t prevent her children from learning about the separation. Despite her best efforts and all of her hopes and dreams, her son appears to lack a conscious and even though she loves him with all her heart she fears he doesn’t even like her and wonders if he ever did. Given her recent setbacks, she has paid careful attention to how she wanted events to unfold this evening and initially all seemed to be going well - getting the others to leave before her was effortless, she only had to offer to do the dishes and Gabby and Susan scampered away so quickly that it’s hard not to believe that she has the power to control people. Everything had gone the way she had envisioned, as though she engineered the evening in her mind and the world bent to her whim, the way it used to, and she is just about to launch into the conversation that she has convinced herself will go as smoothly in reality as it has the numerous times that she has practiced it in her head, when she steps back from the sink and everything changes with a tiny crack as something crushes beneath her shoe. She leans down to pick up the offending object and looks at Lynette questioningly as she rolls the now mutilated but still recognisable remains of a pill around in her hand.

“I was going to tell you to ignore what I said earlier, that maybe I don’t know what I am talking about and you shouldn’t medicate the boys but it seems you’ve already made up your mind.”

Lynette shrugs before responding, “I thought about it but I can’t do it.”

“It’s okay, they’re your boys and I can understand why you’d be frightened about how the medication might change them.”

“Oh there is that but when I say I can’t, I mean I literally can’t, I couldn’t get them to open their mouths and take the damn things once, so I can’t see how I would be able to get a regular dose into them which makes it kind of pointless, the decision is out of my hands.”

“You should do what you feel is right, they may be a challenge,” she is pleased to note that Lynette meets her repeat use of the euphemism for the twins with a bemused smirk, “but I think I was out of line when I was suggesting that you should try medicating them, recent events have led me to believe that I am not an expert when it comes to child raising.”

“Andrew?”

Her only response is to nod sheepishly.

“Want to talk about it?”

“Yes and no.”

“Will wine help?”

“Yes and no,” the words might be the same but this time she clearly adds more emphasis to the yes portion of her answer. Lynette gathers the glasses while she takes a seat at the kitchen table, she brings the dish towel with her and folds it into perfectly even rectangles, studiously ignoring the eye roll that Lynette gives in response to her actions. Lynette joins her at the table, pushing the wine glass in her general direction but not close enough that she doesn’t have to reach across the table to get it.

“So I have some competition in the worst mother in the world department then?”

“I guess so, I don’t really understand him any more, I don’t know how to reach him and it worries me,” she pauses to take a large and definitely unladylike sip from her glass, “I had to go to a strip club the other day and I can’t stop thinking about it.”

Lynette almost chokes on her drink before spraying the table with the contents of her mouth, her display making the coffee that leaks from the mug the boys made her seem incidental in comparison, “Now there’s a sentence I never thought I’d hear come out of the mouth of Bree Van De Kamp.’

“Do you have to make everything so puerile?” she can’t stop herself from grabbing the dishcloth and wiping down the table, Lynette doesn’t seem phased by her behaviour, if anything she seems to accept it as the natural response to the situation.

“Why do you automatically assume my thoughts are puerile? You have no idea what I am thinking about you being there.”

“And I have no desire to find out. I tracked Andrew down there, he was drinking and ogling girls like they were meat, that’s not the way I raised him at least it’s not how I thought I raised him.”

“Honey he’s just a hormonal adolescent he’ll settle down in the next ten to twenty years or so.”

“Why do I come to you for comfort?”

“You come to me for comfort?”

“Well I’m not going to do it again.” Lynette melodramatically feigns being wounded; miming at plunging a knife into her own heart and once again Bree ignores her far from subtle non-verbals. “I had to sit with him for a while before I could convince him to leave.”

“At the risk of being accused of being puerile, I have to say that this story just keeps getting better and better.”

“Could you at least try to be serious about this?”

“I’m sorry, it’s just that the image of you somewhere like that is hard to conjure, did you have to avert your eyes the whole time?”

“No, I’m not quite as prudish as you think. I was watching but only so I could comment on the spectacle and make Andrew realise what he was doing by objectifying the girl.” 

“And this worked?

“It got him to leave but I while I was telling him that she had probably had a terrible life in order to end up on that stage I couldn’t help but think that I’ve have done something really wrong with Andrew for him to want to be there,” the contents of her glass have become infinitely more fascinating and she gazes at them intently.

“Lots of boys go to places like that, I think you are reading too much into it.”

“Yeah but I taught him to believe that such things are sinful, I don’t think he cares if he goes to hell.” 

“Stop catastrophising Bree I don’t think it’s that bad.”

“My son was looking at near naked women in a public place, I think I am being restrained, I should have grounded him for the rest of his natural life but I settled for taking the door off his room.”

Lynette’s eyes go wide at Bree’s confession, “So exactly what is it about his behaviour that bothers you?”

“I can’t believe I would have to spell it out for you.”

“You went to Europe right?”

She feels blindsided by what she perceives to be a dramatic shift in the course of the conversation, “Yes but I can’t begin to imagine what you think that has to do with the subject and before you ask I did not go to Amsterdam.”

“I never for a moment imagined that you did and that’s not what I am referring to anyway, I assume that you spent a lot of time in museums and art galleries?”

“Yes,” she replies hesitantly.

“Did not these art galleries have lots of statues and paintings of naked people?”

“That’s hardly the same.”

“Why not? People probably posed for those and just cause society has arbitrarily decided to consider those things art, it doesn’t mean that they weren’t objectified or that people don’t get some sort of sexual pleasure by looking at them.”

“I can’t believe you that can compare taking your clothes off in a seedy bar that is rank with sweat and smoke with fine art.”

“People spend a fortune going to the ballet and you can try and tell me that it’s about the story or about their skills but when you boil it down it’s still scantly clad bodies up on stage, why have we decided that that is an acceptable way to make a living and something that should be respected but exotic dancing isn’t?”

“I should have known that you’d feel this way, that you wouldn’t see this sort of place for the den of inequity that it is, you’d probably have a good time there.”

This time the hurt look isn’t feigned, “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You know what that means, you don’t need me to tell you.”

“I thought we agreed never to talk about that.”

“I don’t know if “I was really drunk, you were there, I’m sorry and I’ll never do it again” counts as an actual conversation Lynette.”

“You said you forgave me, we were going to put that behind us.”

“It’s not the easy for me.”

“Evidently not.” Lynette’s words are short and sharp.

“Can we just go back to the strip club issue?”

“Do you promise not to insult me any more?”

“Lynette I am a lady, I was raised never to make promises that I can’t keep.”

“Fine but this better be worth it for me, tell me that you got into an ethical debate with the owners of the establishment.”

“Nothing of the sort.”

“Did you at least threaten to have the place shut down?”

“Sorry to disappoint you.”

Lynette polishes off her glass and reaches for the bottle, “I am failing to find the bit where this is fun for me anymore.”

“What if I told you that I was thinking a lot about the girl and what would have to happen to make you choose to make money that way?”

“Bree stripping is not the same as prostitution.”

“I’m pretty sure it’s a slippery slope but that’s not what I’m talking about. It got me thinking if women I know could have ended up there if their lives were different.”

“So was this an actual intellectual exercise or was it just a convenient excuse to picture people you know swinging themselves around poles?” Bree doesn’t answer but the blush that floods her face speaks volumes, “Bree! I am so proud of you right now.”

“I’m not entirely comfortable with having these thoughts so I certainly don’t think we should be celebrating.”

“Don’t be so uptight, they are just thoughts.”

“And Hitler was just a little misunderstood.”

“That’s hardly a fair analogy. Come on, lighten up, we can have some fun with this. Did you picture Gabby? I think she would love it, she likes to be looked at and she has no problem with wearing next to nothing but I don’t know if she’d work a pole so well, she is very short, I think she’d look awkward. You know sometimes I wonder if she really was a model at all or are they not so strict with the height requirement nowadays?”

She refuses to laugh but is finding this more enjoyable than she should be comfortable with, “Susan is probably too skinny, you wouldn’t see her when she’s behind the pole.”

“Ouch, I’m impressed, don’t stop now.”

“She would probably fall over or would get the clasps of her bra stuck and not be able to get it off, she may fill some speciality niche market but I don’t think she’d ever be a mainstream success.”

“Did you just refer to stripping as a mainstream activity?” the mischievous smile that lights up Lynette’s face is had to ignore.

“Leave me alone, do you want me to go with this or not?”

“Far be it for me to look a gift horse in the mouth. I want to trash Edie but I think we both know she’d excel at it, she’s probably supported herself by taking her clothes off at some point in her life.”

“Rumour has it that she still does.”

“Where is this bitchiness coming from? Not that I’m complaining, I like the new you.”

The liquid in her glass has become mesmerising again and she can’t move her eyes from it, “It’s easier than telling you what I came here to tell you.’

“You weren’t thinking about Martha were you?”

Her body gives an involuntary tremor of distaste at the thought alone, “Definitely not and I may have nightmares about that now.”

“Did you wonder what it would be like to be up there yourself,” Lynette stands up and leans across the table and like a dangerous predator toys with Bree’s scarf, “did you picture people going crazy as you slowly removed your carefully co-ordinated accessories?” her fingers deftly remove the purple material from Bree’s neck and she runs the garment across Bree’s arm before dropping it in her lap.

She audibly gulps, she wasn’t even aware she could do that, “No it wasn’t that either.”

“So am I meant to deduce that you pictured me?”

“Don’t sound so gleeful, this is so not good,” she looks up tentatively and watches as Lynette’s brow crinkles in an adorable fashion.

“I didn’t do a good job?”

“I think you’d be great and that’s the problem.”

“Don’t worry, this can make us even, I won’t mention it and you don’t mention my drunken advances towards you.”

She reaches for Lynette’s hand while she makes the understatement of the year, “But we’re not even,” in fact they are so far from even that even isn’t on the map, since _that_ night she can’t stop herself thinking about Lynette, she is pretty sure that that is a major factor in the breakdown of her marriage but try as she might, and she has tried very hard, she can’t stop the thoughts. When Lynette looks at her or touches her it hits her like a tidal wave of emotion and she is helpless in its wake. “I kissed you back.”

“Hmmm.”

She would take a deep breath to calm her nerves but she’s too busy hyperventilating to the point that she’s at risk of passing out, “That night, I kissed you back.”

“We were both drunk Bree, can’t we just forget about it and move on?”

“Why won’t you talk about this?”

“It happened, we can’t change it, so we should just let it go because I don’t want to ruin our friendship and I don’t want you to hate me.”

“I could never hate you and I didn’t hate the kiss either.”

“No?”

“Not even a little bit,” she’s manages to hold Lynette’s gaze and is ridiculously proud of herself.

“So if we got drunk and I tried to kiss you again that would be okay?”

“I would have to say that the probability is high.”

Lynette’s eyes sparkle with infinite possibilities, “More wine Bree?”

“Yes and no.”

Lynette winks at her and caresses her hand before refilling their glasses, “I can live with that.” And although it goes against absolutely everything she believes in and she fears that this thing between them is beyond her control, so can Bree.


End file.
